soogee-moogeen.

1882 D. Kemp Man. Yacht & Boat Sailing (ed. 3) 579 Soojee Moojee, a caustic composition sold by yacht fitters for cleaning off old paint, varnish, &c.

1894 R. C. Leslie Waterbiogr. xiii. 248 A certain caustic composition, known to yachtsmen by the mysterious name of ‘skewgy-mewgy’.

1900 F. T. Bullen Men of Merchant Service xiii. 120 No tramp second mate can hope to keep his hands out of the paint pot or the soogee-moogee bucket.

1903 A. Sonnichsen Deep Sea Vagabonds iii. 37 There was soodgee-moodgee. Soodgee is a sailor's horror; it means to wash paint-work with a strong solution of soda and water.

1907 M. Roberts Flying Cloud xxiv. 229 She was as clean as a new pin with sand and canvas and souji-mouji.

1913 A. W. Nelson Yankee Swanson 57 He had a good scrubbing down with ‘sudje mudje’.

1924 ‘P. Blundell’ Confessions of Seaman xii. 164 With a bucket containing hot soap and soda water—sougi-mougi sailors call it—he ascended ladders in the swaying engine-room and washed paint work.

1934 J. Hanley in Spectator 26 Jan. 131/1 ‘There are no sailors to-day,’ says [Conrad], ‘only Sugi-Mugi men’... Mere washers of paint. Deck-hands on modern ships wash and chip paint, morning, noon and night.

1938 W. E. Dexter Rope-yarns 82 In all the sailing ships I was in I never came across a long-handled holystone, or caustic soda, or ‘soogy-moogy’.

1939 H. Hughes Through Mighty Seas ii. 36 All hands wallowed in soogie moogie.

1962 A. G. Course Dict. Naut. Terms 182 Soogee moogee, a liquid used for cleaning paintwork and woodwork consisting of soda and water or soap and water.

1935 Sea Breezes Jan. 60 The equipment, particularly the sails, would be so perfect that my crew wouldn't mind the ‘sooje-mooje’ such perfection entailed.

1945 Time 31 Dec. 96/3 Soon Sailor Slobodkin..found himself loading cargo, eating slop and doing soogie moogie (scrubbing paint work) with a crew.